Xbox One controller will be PC compatible, but not until 2014

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Yesterday Major Nelson spent 7 minutes breaking down why the Xbox One controller is going to be awesome. And now we’ve had it confirmed that PC gamers should get excited about the controller too, although not immediately.

Microsoft has stated that it fully intends to support use of the Xbox One controller on PC, but that we shouldn’t expect compatibility to appear this year. The reason for the delay is one of architectures.

Microsoft needs to make the Xbox One pad work seamlessly with any and all PC games that currently function using the Xbox 360 pad. However, the architecture of the two controllers is very different, as is the wireless protocol, which means the software required to support the Xbox One pad is more complex and therefore is going to take a while to finish.

That delay also has to be in part because PC support is a secondary issue, and Microsoft is fully focused on getting the Xbox One to market and selling units. After that initial launch period is over, the dev support team will have more time to focus on PC support and making those intriguing impulse triggers available for use in games that run on Windows.

Of course, it’s a different story for the Kinect sensor. Microsoft has stated that the Xbox One version isn’t compatible with anything other than the console. That means the second generation Kinect will be a completely separate product for PC, and one that is expected to cost $399, which is almost as much as the Xbox One with Kinect bundle costs.